Oxford Borough Council unanimously
approved a contract extension with borough manager Brian Hoover for
two more years at its meeting on Feb. 19.

Hoover was hired by the borough in July
of 2016 after previously serving as the borough manager of Glenolden,
Pa. for 13 years.

Borough council also approved a
settlement agreement with Police Chief John Slauch, whose contract
was not extended at the end of 2017. The terms of the settlement
agreement were not disclosed.

A considerable amount of time was also
spent discussing items related to the proposed parking garage.

The project is now going through the
land-development process, and there are a lot of activities
associated to it that officials are handling simultaneously. Steve
Krug of Krug Architects, the firm that has been facilitating the
development of the parking garage, provided the monthly update about
the project, explaining that officials were scheduled to meet with
engineers in the coming days.

Pauline Garcia-Allen of Econ Partners,
updated borough council about the ongoing efforts to secure funding
for the project. Including a $1 million private gift from an
anonymous donor, the borough has secured approximately $5 million in
funding for the project. Another grant application was to be filed by
the Feb. 27 deadline in an effort to acquire additional funding. The
borough is also applying for a waiver of a matching requirement for
one of the grants that it has secured.

Council member Robert Ketcham made an
impromptu presentation. He questioned the methodology of a parking
study that was completed about seven years ago, and said that the
deficit of parking spaces in the downtown district identified by the
study might not be accurate. He said that now that the borough has
metered spaces in three parking lots in the downtown, they will have
a better idea of how often those spaces are used, and about how much
existing demand for parking there is in the downtown. The borough is
going to ask Spotts Stevens and McCoy, the firm that completed the
parking study, to come to a meeting in March to detail the
methodology of the study.

In other business, Garcia-Allen also
talked about the possibility of acquiring grant money to pay for
issues that are identified through an environmental site assessment
and asbestos inspection. The borough has retained EnviroSure, Inc. to
do the first phase of an environmental site assessment.

During public comment, Randy Grace, a
borough resident, business owner, and a former council member, asked
the longtime members to talk about where they stand with regard to
the parking garage project. Grace noted that the three new council
members have recently received a lot of new information about the
project, so he didn't want to put them on the spot and ask them to
share their views on the project. But he wanted to get an idea of
whether the veteran council members still supported the project,
which has already moved well beyond the talking phase.

Council member Ron Hershey said that he
still supports the project, and he believes it will be beneficial for
Oxford.

Peggy Ann Russell, the council vice
president, pointed out that she voted against the project last year,
and nothing has occurred to change her mind—she is still in
opposition to the project, she said.

Council member John Thompson affirmed
his support of moving forward with the project, saying, “I 100
percent support it. The funding is there.”